


something like home

by blindbatalex



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: M/M, a winter fic set in boston, be warned that fic is bleak af, friends to lovers to who knows, my first foray into writing a full length hockey fic!!! like whaaat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-05
Updated: 2018-01-05
Packaged: 2019-02-28 13:34:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13272495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blindbatalex/pseuds/blindbatalex
Summary: David paints universes with his words. He wraps an arm around Willy so that Willy’s head is resting on his chest, rising and falling with each breath, and he talks about the future - their future - his voice soft as a whisper.Somewhere warm,he says around a smile,like Florida. No more snow.Willy has an off day and visits David in Boston. Distance has a funny way of getting in the way of things. Written for the one sentence prompt "who gave you that black eye?"





	something like home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ph_1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ph_1/gifts).



> Friends here it is, the first piece of real writing I've done for this fandom. It's unbeta-ed and I'm new to hockey so all mistakes are my own. 
> 
> Dear ph_1 your original holiday gift met a terrible fate in the swamp that is my Stuck and I Can't Get Unstuck part of my WIP folder. Consider this replacement my thank you/ your punishment for getting me into hockey!! <3 <3  
>  **edit** : everything in the past are in italics now, in case I was confusing anyone before.

**come visit me if u have an off day its cold and im lonely :(** the text reads on the all too bright screen of his phone. 

Willy shifts onto his back, props himself up just a little. 

It takes him five minutes to book air tickets.

*

_The first time he kisses David his heart flutters in his chest so much so that he wonders if perhaps there is something wrong with it. He takes a step back, trying to even out his breathing, and David smiles at him, a hand still clutching at the back of his neck._

_Willy looks and sees that no, David is in no better shape than him, his cheeks flushed and his eyes cast on the ground._

_Fuck, he mutters under his breath, because he is out of his depth here - a voice in the back of his head is telling him that kissing a boy - his teammate - is a terrible idea and still David, here in his arms, with his shy smile and puckered lips, is the most beautiful thing he laid his eyes on._

_Fuck._

*

Boston is cold, though no colder than Toronto. The harbor gleams blue gray under an overcast sky beyond the dirtied window of his water taxi. Snow shuffles from the sky in starts and stops, as if it can’t make up its mind one way or the other. 

Willy hugs his coat a little tighter, makes himself smaller as he tries not to shiver.

*

_David paints universes with his words. He wraps an arm around Willy so that Willy’s head is resting on his chest, rising and falling with each breath, and he talks about the future - their future - his voice soft as a whisper._

_Somewhere warm, he says around a smile, like Florida. No more snow._

_There are alligators in Florida, Willy whines, already half asleep. His arm is wrapped tightly around David’s middle._

_California, then. Los Angeles. We will watch the sun set over the ocean from our porch, the water burning blue and orange and red. Learn how to surf. I will kiss you on ice for the world to see when we lift the Cup together._

_You are an idiot, you know that? Willy mutters, though there is no heat in his voice. He is smiling too._

_They are pipe dreams, all of them, Willy knows like he knows his own name. And yet, in that sweet place between sleep and waking he can see it so well - David in his arms when the horn sounds in the middle of a fancy arena filled to the brim, the fans delirious with joy._

_David talks and talks and the US unravels in front of his eyes like a land from some fantastical dream, vast and impossible and theirs for the taking._

*

David opens the door at the first ring and all Willy can see is David’s right eye, swollen and bruised. 

Willy stands firmly rooted to the door. “Who gave you that black eye?” he asks, his voice a little distant in his ears.

David is hurt, he is hurt someone did this to him and Willy had no idea.

David draws him into a hug. “Hello to you to stranger,” he says and Willy can practically hear his grin. “Stop standing there like a confused bean pole and come in.”

The penthouse is warm, as always, a tad too much so for Willy. He takes a seat at the sofa, stripping out of his coat and scarf and watches David strut back from the kitchen with glasses of water. 

He looks alright, Willy decides, his hair sticking out in all directions as it does most of the time, his gait easy, he is alright.

“Stop looking at me like I’ve grown a second head,” David flashes another grin, a little stilted around the edges but warm nonetheless. He sits on the armchair across from Willy and hands him one of the glasses. “How was your flight?”

Willy tells him about the old man next to him who spent the entire flight first sharing his life story and then offering unsolicited advice.

“One who likes roses bears the thorns,” he mimics, keeping his face as straight as possible.

That draws a laugh out of David, and something warm settles in Willy’s chest among the concern and the awkwardness that comes from distance. He’s missed this, he realizes - forgotten how David’s laughter sounds in person, when it isn’t coming through a pixelated video call, open and loud and genuine.

*

_“We made it,” David tells him in between kisses, half-delirious with glee and Willy can’t help but grin back, his heart beating in his ears._

_NHL._

_They made it._

_“So much for shorts and sunsets together though,” he says later, much later, trying to keep any hint of disappointment from his voice. He knew it of course. They both did._

_David makes a non-committal sound._

_“It’s a two hour flight, we’ll be in each other’s cities all the time.”_

_There is no doubt in David’s voice, no hesitation and Willy loves him for it._

_If he closes his eyes and tries hard enough he can almost believe him, too._

*

The walk over to the Christmas market is quiet at first, to the extent any of their conversations can be classified as quiet. They huddle in their coats and scarfs and beanies and talk about hockey, and how cold it is and a bunch of other things that don’t really matter as they make their way through the red brick buildings of the North End. 

There is so much to catch up on, so much he wants to tell David and so much he wants to ask but the words don’t come easily yet and so Willy lets them be, waits for the ice to thaw on its own.

He does link their arms when the City Hall appears in the horizon though, its gray concrete body even more ominous today under the steely sky. “Are you sure that thing isn’t haunted, or cursed or both?” he asks, rather suspiciously. The building gives him seriously bad vibes every time he walks by it.

David follows his gaze to the structure, tells him it’s probably both.

He matches Willy’s pace so that their steps are aligned as they climb up the stairs to the City plaza where the markets and the ice rink is set up. He doesn’t let go of David’s arm and Willy snuggles in just that much closer, pretends that it’s for warmth.

 

*

_Willy cares and loves and misses but the pace in the league is punishing, more than either of them anticipated, and the sheer effort it takes to fight for a place in the first team leaves him exhausted._

_The schedule they set up is marked in the calendar he has hanging up on his wall - the days he is supposed to visit David and the days David is supposed to come over circled in red and dotted with exclamation points, carefully planned around their off days, planned so that they won’t go more than a couple of weeks without seeing each other._

_He won’t remember later whether it was he who cancelled that first time or if it was David. It doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things probably. They still see each other, gushing with stories about their new teammates and cities and everything in between. He treats David to poutine. David tells him that he must try the chowder._

_He talks to David for hours before his debut with the Bruins too, way past what should be David’s bedtime, and David calls him before every game in the World Juniors, distracts with a sleight of hand only he can pull when they get knocked out._

_It’s good - this thing that they have - he can hear it creaking around the seams maybe but it’s good and it’s theirs and he will be damned if he lets go without a fight._

_That’s what he tells himself, anyway._

*

“Okay but who gave you the black eye?” Willy asks between sips of mulled wine. The thing that gets to him is that it’s already on its way to healing - must be at least a week old.

Time was David would video call him the moment it happened, excited to show his newest “battle mark” off as he calls it, or send five pictures at least of him pulling goofy faces and accompanied by exclamation points.

Time was Willy watched the highlights of every Bruins game on the day of so he’d know it the moment it happened. Would get to the phone and call if he didn’t hear from David.

David leans in closer and offers him a conspiratorial wink. “Why?” he asks, “Will you go avenge it as my knight in shining armor come the next game? Get a fighting major on my behalf?”

Willy turns towards him and meets his eye. “Aren’t you putting your team first these days?” he says, his voice lower than it needs to be. There is hardly any space between his face and David’s and if he surged forward now his lips would be on David’s before David even knew it. “We might concede a power play goal, drop points, the whole deal. Would be good for your team.” 

The confusion and the disappointment of last month still burns red hot in the back of his throat. David didn’t even bother to call him, just texted, to cancel their pre-game dinner because he deemed it - deemed _him_ \- bad luck to the team. 

David chuckles at the jab, the sound short and somewhat clipped, and draws back so that he is facing straight ahead towards the ice rink. 

They beat the Bruins anyway.

*

_He doesn’t remember either who it was that said they couldn’t be exclusive anymore._

_There are the fights before - Willy’s jealousy when David celebrates too hard with Krug - David’s guilt when he kisses a cute blonde in a club in Boston - and a vague promise to always remain friends._

_He wonders every night for a while whether there is someone in David’s bed right now, kissing him, fucking him, sleeping with an arm wrapped around him even as he himself kisses and fucks and falls asleep next to strangers._

_And then he lets that go too. Learns not to ask when they talk and take what he can whenever they visit each other._

_It works, most of the time._

*

David finds his hand later, when they are meandering around the stalls. He holds it firm and tight like Willy’s hand belongs in his and nowhere else. 

It’s a weekday and there aren’t many people in the market and no one to see him squeeze David’s hand back, quietly accept the apology tucked in there.

“I take it that you are still single then?” Willy asks, as casually as possible. Figures that if David did have someone he wouldn’t be holding hands with him in broad daylight in the middle of the city.

“Dude.” David stops in his tracks and forces Willy to stop too. “I would have told you.”

“Like you told me about your eye?”

David’s eyes are on him in an instant, his gaze sharp and cutting, before he turns away again, and sighs.

“You know how it is,” he says finally, his voice quiet “it wasn’t like I was hiding it from you.”

Regret mingles in Willy’s chest with something like relief.

He picks up David’s hand again where David let it fall to his side. “I know,” he says, “sorry.” David takes a step forward - they are, Willy realizes, kind of standing right in the middle of the way - and puts his free hand on top to envelop Willy’s in both of his own. He rests his head on Willy’s shoulder for a moment, their hands clasped firmly in the space between their chests and takes in a tired breath.

Willy’s forgotten how welcome the weight of David’s head feels against his shoulder, how welcome his breath against his neck.

He’s forgotten too, he realizes, how easy it is to miss someone 

\- to miss David - 

while he is still right here at his side.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Kudos and especially comments are my life blood & what keeps me going.  
> Notes:  
> \-- Come find me on [tumblr](https://blindbatalex.tumblr.com/) \- I need more hockey mutuals!  
> \-- A fun fact about Boston's City Hall is that it was once voted [the ugliest building in the world](http://archive.boston.com/news/local/articles/2008/11/15/city_hall_picked_one_of_worlds_ugliest_buildings/). Just saying.


End file.
